His back arched sensuously and he moaned. She turned her face, so that her long hair brushed across his hips and thighs, and he whispered her name.
She nipped at his waist with her teeth while her fingers slowly, torturously made their way up his powerful legs to his flat stomach.
Seconds later, she felt herself lifted and turned, felt his mouth catch and half swallow her breast, his tongue rough on the hard nipple as he began to suckle her.
She shivered with delight, holding his head to her body. His hands were smoothing over her, learning her. One slid between her thighs and coaxed her legs apart.
He touched her then in a way he never had before, and she gasped at the unexpected surge of pleasure the exquisitely slow movements of his fingers aroused. All the while, his mouth was warm on her taut breast, drawing the nipple into the moist darkness with devastating expertise.
Her eyes closed as she let the pleasure wash over her. Her body twisted sinuously under his hands and mouth, soft moans whispering out of her throat while the minutes grew hotter and more feverish.
His mouth gently covered hers while his fingers trespassed in a new and frightening way. There was a brief flash of pain and she moaned, but his mouth gentled her, moving lovingly from her lips to her closed eyelids while his hand began to rouse her all over again. The pain was quickly forgotten as her hips began to lift toward those tormenting fingers.
She felt his breath on her lips, just before he whispered her name. Her eyes opened slowly, half-dazed, and met his.
Holding them, he moved slowly between her legs, levering down carefully. "No, don't look away," he said shakily.
She swallowed, because she could feel him now in an intimacy unlike anything they'd ever shared. He was much more potent than she remembered, powerful and a little intimidating.
"Hold on," he murmured. "Dig your nails into me, if it helps."
She gasped as his hips arched down into hers, very carefully. He pushed, softly, and she tensed despite her resolve.
"Shh," he whispered, his eyes tender. "You knew it would be difficult. But you can take me. Try to relax. Try to let your body absorb mine. Think of a stone falling into water," he said softly as he moved. "Absorb me, little one. Take me...inside you."
The imagery was arousing. She drew her eyes down to their bodies and caught her breath at what she saw.
"No, don't look there," he said gently, convinced even now that she was going to panic. "Look at me, Anna."
She lifted her eyes back up to his, but there was no fear in them. She arched her back, her breath catching, her eyes misty now with desire. "I watched," she said unsteadily. "Evan, I saw...!"
She pushed harder, absorbing him. There was a burning sensation, a stabbing pain. She cried out, but she pushed harder. And then it was easy. Slow. Soft.
Her breathing began to quicken and she managed a smile as she sought his eyes. "Oh...yes!" she moaned, shaking as she experienced the full power of his masculinity.
He let out a ragged breath. "Yes." He bent to her lips as his body began the slow, familiar rhythm. He nibbled her mouth as his muscles tautened, as his hips lifted and fell with exquisite tenderness.
Her fingers slid to the base of his spine and lingered, stroking him. He shuddered. She liked that, so she did it again.
"Stop," he ground out. "You'll make me lose control."
"I want you to," she whispered with a tiny smile, arching her mouth up to his. "Let go," she breathed at his lips. "Let go, Evan. It's all right, darling, you won't hurt me. It's all right. Let go, Evan...let go...!"
"Anna!" Her name was a tormented groan as he gave in to her coaxing and suddenly drove feverishly for fulfillment. He lost his fear of hurting her and every vestige of control, in the violent need to experience ecstasy, to satisfy the throbbing, savage ache in his loins.
Even through her own building pleasure, Anna watched him achieve it. As she felt the crush of his arms and the weight of him, she saw his torso lift, his back arch tautly, his face contort as if with the most incredible kind of agony. He threw back his head and cried out, shuddering against her so violently that she thought he might actually lose consciousness.
When he stiffened and fell heavily against her, she was still shivering with her own unsatisfied need. She clutched at his broad shoulders, biting him helplessly as she moved under his weight. When he started to lift his hips, she caught them with her nails and held him there.
"No, please...!" she sobbed.
"Almost, but not quite, is that it, sweetheart?" he whispered huskily. "Give me your mouth, little one, and hold on tight. I'll satisfy you completely, now."
She turned her face up and he kissed her gently, his tongue suddenly stabbing into her mouth as his hips rose and fell slowly.
It took only seconds. She sobbed her pleasure under his mouth, so racked by ecstasy that she could only cling to him while the rhythm wrung every last silvery bit of strength out of her.
He kissed the tears away, but she still wouldn't let go of him.
"All right," he whispered, smiling through his exhaustion as he settled back over her, his forearms catching his weight. He kissed her gently, soft kisses that calmed and soothed and comforted. All that worry, he thought ruefully, and for nothing! He hadn't killed her after all, even if, for a few delicious seconds, she had sounded as though she were dying.
"Don't go away," she whispered. "Hold me."
He kissed her very gently. "It was for your own sake that I was moving away, not for mine. I thought you might be uncomfortable. It was difficult for you."
Her arms contracted. "I love you," she whispered. "It was heaven."
"For me, too." He sighed softly and rested his cheek against hers, his eyes closed as he savored her softness under him. "Are you all right? It didn't hurt too much?"
"No." She nibbled at his earlobe. "Now will you stop running from me?"
"Do I have a choice?" He looked down at her tenderly. "You took me without fear," he said, his voice coloring with pride and pleasure.
"Yes." She blushed a little and dropped her eyes to his mouth.
"None of that." He tilted her face up and searched her shy eyes. "I didn't hold back. I couldn't. We never discussed precautions..."
Her face brightened. "I could be pregnant."
The way she said it made his heart lift. "Yes." He smoothed back her long, soft blond hair. "You're very young."
"Not that young." She lifted herself to his mouth and began to kiss him, slowly, seductively.
"It's too soon," he said huskily. "You need time to get over what we just did."
She did, but she hated the thought of giving up the closeness they were sharing. Her eyes told him so.
"Come here." He wrapped her up against him and pulled the sheet over them, pausing to brush a kiss across her nose before his arm contracted around her, bringing her even closer. "We'll sleep a bit longer."
"And then?" she whispered.
He smiled. "And then."
She closed her own eyes, sliding into a deep and dreamless sleep. When she awoke, the smell of beig-nets—little square sugar-dusted doughnuts—and jam and fresh coffee filled the room.
"Hungry?" Evan asked. He was wearing his slacks and nothing else, and he looked younger and lighthearted and totally loving. That could have been a trick of the light, of course, she told herself. But she could dream.
"I'm starved," she confessed, sitting up.
He pulled the sheet away and looked at her, his eyes darkening with possession. "My,God, you are so beautiful," he said, his voice deep and uneven.
"Flatterer," she whispered softly.
He sat down beside her, his eyes searching hers while his hands stroked slowly down her body. She caught her breath and stiffened with pleasure and he bent to kiss the hardened tips of her breasts.
But when she tried to trap his mouth against her, he shook his head and pulled away. "It's too soon for you," he said, his eyes full of tender wisdom. "We've got t
he rest of our lives to love each other in bed."
"It felt like that," she said softly. "Like...loving, I mean."
"Shouldn't it?" he asked, his eyes holding hers. "When two people love each other as much as we do?"
Her heart stopped beating. "You...don't," she whispered.
"Then why did I marry you, little one?" he asked quietly. "If sex was all I wanted, any woman would have done."
She thought she might faint.
"I was trying to spare you what Louisa suffered at my hands." He smiled bitterly. "She never loved me, Anna. And I never knew it. Until you told me."
Her breath was trapped somewhere in her throat.
He touched her face with a big, gentle hand. "I was sacrificing my happiness for what I thought was yours. After what Louisa had said to me, I was terrified of hurting you like that. And you were so young... But when Randall told me you were marrying him, I thought I'd go mad," he choked. “That was bad enough. But you were mugged, and I didn't even know it until hours later. You could have died, and I wouldn't have been there, with you. Your last memory of me would have been of the way I'd hurt you," he said roughly.
Tears stung her eyes. What he felt was naked in his face, in his voice. Why hadn't she seen it, known it? "You...love me!" she exclaimed, awed.
"Love. Adore. Worship." He framed her face in his hands and kissed her with aching tenderness. "Oh, God, you're the very breath in my body!"
He bore her down on the mattress, his mouth ardent and faintly rough with passion, his hands insistent on her body as he kissed her. She gave unstint-ingly, loving him so deeply that it hurt.
"I love you," he whispered finally, his mouth against her throat. "I'll die loving you."
She held him, her eyes closed, her heart overflowing. "I love you, too, Evan," she said drowsily. "Endlessly."
He bent again to her mouth, the look in his eyes before he kissed her so adoring that she melted under him. The kiss went on and on and on, into levels they'd never touched before.
Finally he managed to drag himself away. "You'd better eat something," he murmured, his voice faintly unsteady. "I have to build up your strength for the next few days, after you've had time to recuperate."
She laughed and looked up at him. "That goes double for you," she murmured demurely. "You're not the only one with expectations."
He burst out laughing. A minute later he picked her up in his big arms and carried her to the breakfast table. For the first time he gloried in his strength, in her trusting submission to it. All the ghosts were laid to rest, now. He looked down at her, so soft in his arms, and felt as if he had everything. He sat down at the table with Anna cuddled in his lap. Not content with that, he spoon-fed her every single bite.
From that moment on, they were inseparable, and every day brought a new and ardent memory. Anna's nightmares faded, and her painful experience with the mugger became nothing more than a bad dream. Weeks later, a big, brutal man was found in a back alley dead of a drug overdose. He was a suspect in several violent robberies in Houston, the paper said, and at least one rape. A violent end for a violent man, but his death gave Anna peace.
Polly and Duke settled down to a happy life together, while Anna and Evan moved into a newly remodeled house on the Tremayne ranch, a wedding present from Evan's brothers. It included a studio for Anna, and she went back to her painting with a vengeance. But in addition to her landscapes she did one portrait—of her new husband.
"Do I really look like that?" he asked dryly as he clasped her loosely by the waist and looked over her shoulder at the very flattering painting.
"To me, you do," she said, her eyes full of love.
He smiled before he bent to kiss her. The old specter of his size and strength were gone forever. Secure in the warmth of Anna's love, he couldn't have asked for another single thing, a sentiment she echoed with her whole heart.
Donovan (12-1991)
Chapter One
Fay felt as if every eye in the bar was on her when she walked in. It had been purely an impulse, and she was already regretting it. A lone female walking into a bar on the wrong side of town in south Texas late at night was asking for trouble. Women's lib hadn't been heard of this far out, and several pairs of male eyes were telling her so.
She could only imagine how she looked in her tight designer jeans, her feet encased in silk hose and high heels, a soft yellow knit sweater showing the faint swell of her high breasts. Her long dark hair was around her shoulders in soft swirls, and her green eyes darted nervously from one side of the small, smoke-filled room to the other. There was a jukebox playing so loud that she had to yell to tell the bartender she wanted a beer. That was a joke, too, because in all her twenty years, she'd never had a beer. White wine, yes. Even a pina colada down in Jamaica. But never a beer.
Defiance was becoming expensive, she thought, watching a burly man separate himself from his companions with a mumbled remark that made them laugh.
He perched himself beside her at the bar, his narrow eyes giving her an appraisal that made her want to run. "Hello, pretty thing," he said, 'grinning through his beard. "Wanta dance?"
She cupped her hands around the beer mug to stop them from shaking. "No, thank you," she said in her soft, cultured voice, keeping her eyes down. "I'm... waiting for someone."
That was almost true. She'd been waiting for someone all her life, but he hadn't shown up yet. She needed him now. She was living with a mercenary, social-climbing relative who was doing his best to sell her to a rich friend with eyes that made her skin crawl. All her money was tied up in trust, and she was stuck with her mother's brother. Rescue was certainly uppermost in her mind, but this rowdy cowboy wasn't her idea of a white knight.
"You and me could have a good time, honey," her admirer continued, unabashed. He smoothed her sweater-clad arm and she withdrew as if his fingers were snakes. "Now, don't start backing away, sweet thing! I know how to treat a lady."
No one noticed the dark face in the corner suddenly lift, or saw the dangerous glitter in silver eyes that dominated it. No one noticed the look he gave the girl, or the colder one that he gave her companion before he got gracefully to his feet and moved toward the bar.
He wore jeans, too. Not like Fay's, because his were working jeans. They were faded and stained from work, and his boots were a howling thumbed nose at city cowboys' elegant footwear. His hat was blacker than his thick, unruly hair, a little crumpled here and there. He was tall. Very tall. Lean and muscular and quite well-known locally. His temper, in fact, was as legendary as the big fists now curled with deceptive laxness at his sides as he walked.
"You'd like me if you just got to know me—" The pudgy cowboy broke off when the newcomer came into his line of vision. He became almost comically still, his head slightly cocked. "Why, hello, Donavan," he began uneasily. "I didn't know she was with you."
"Now you do," he replied in a deep, gravelly voice that sent chills down Fay's spine.
She turned her head and looked into diamond-glinted eyes, and lost her heart forever. She couldn't seem to breathe.
"It's about time you showed up," he told Fay. He took her arm, eased her down from the bar stool with a grip that was firm and exciting. He handed her beer mug to her, and with a last cutting glare at the other man, he escorted her back to his table.
"Thank you," she stammered when she was sitting beside him. He'd left a cigarette smoking in the dented metal ashtray, and a half-touched glass of whiskey. He didn't take off his hat when he sat down. She'd noticed that Western men seemed to have little use for the courtesies she'd taken for granted back home.
He picked up his cigarette and took a long draw from it. His nails were flat and clean, despite traces of grease that clung to his long-fingered, dark hands. They were beautiful masculine hands, with no jewelry adorning them. Working hands, she thought idly.
"Who are you?" he asked suddenly.
“I’m Fay," she told him. She forced a smile.
"And you...?"
"Most people just call me Donavan."
She took a sip of beer and grimaced. It tasted terrible. She stared at it with an expression that brought a faint smile to the man's hard, thin mouth.
"You don't drink beer, and you don't belong in a bar. What are you doing on this side of town, debutante?" he drawled.
"I'm running away from home," she said with a laugh. "Escaping my jailers. Having a night on the town. Rebelling. Take your pick."
"Are you old enough to do that?" he asked pointedly.
"If you mean, am I old enough to order a beer in a bar, yes. I'm two months shy of twenty-one."
"You don't look it."
She studied his hard, suntanned face and his unruly hair. With a little trimming up and proper dressing, he might be rather devastating. "Are you from around here?" she asked.
"All my life," he agreed.
"Do you...work?"
"Child, in this part of Texas, everybody works."
He scowled. "Most everybody," he amended, letting his eyes linger pointedly on her diamond tennis bracelet. "Wearing that into a country bar is asking for trouble. Pull your sleeve down."
She did, obeying him instantly when she was known for ignoring anything that sounded like a command at home. She flushed at her instant deference. Maybe she was drunk already. Sure, she mused, on two sips of beer.
"What do you do when you aren't giving orders?" she taunted.
He searched her green eyes. "I'm a ranch foreman," he said. "I give orders for a living."
"Oh. You're a cowboy."
"That's one name for it."
She smiled again. "I've never met a real cowboy before."
"You aren't from here."
She shook her head. "Georgia. My parents were killed in a plane crash, so I was sent out here to live with my uncle." She whistled softly. "You can't imagine what it's like."
Books By Diana Palmer Page 83